


We'll laugh about this someday

by junebugtwin



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alien Biology, Alien Culture, Aliens, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, BAMF Pidge | Katie Holt, Blood and Injury, Burn Wounds, Female Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, Gen, Keith is doing his best, Pidge | Katie Holt Whump, Pidge | Katie Holt is a Mess, Pidge | Katie Holt-centric, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Swearing, Team as Family, Technically Pre-Canon, Violence, and a human disaster, his best could be better, pidge is a cool space scavenger
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-17
Updated: 2020-04-17
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:21:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23703772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/junebugtwin/pseuds/junebugtwin
Summary: In this world Lance, Hunk and Keith rescue Shiro from the Garrison and end up flinging themselves into space, and into a universe spanning war.In this world, Pidge doesn't join them- but that doesn't mean she isn't also destined for the stars.---Pidge crash lands on a planet from hell, and apart from having a Very Bad Time she also happens to make a friend. It seems fate isn't so easily swayed.
Relationships: Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 39





	We'll laugh about this someday

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warning for descriptions of a acid burn, though it's not too gory. Also, over half the words Pidge says in this fic is some sort of swear, so be prepared for that.

She hears water moving slowly, trickling pleasantly against rocks, calm and relaxing and full of nostalgia- and she thinks; _oh, I’m at our cabin!_ For a second before the rest of her memories catch up to her and she thinks; _oh fuck, why can I hear water_

Pidge blinked open her eyes slowly, natural light blinding her for a moment before she adjusted and was able to peer around at her surroundings.

She was still thankfully in her ship, though to be honest the good ol’ gal was looking worse for wear- worser than usual anyway, she hadn’t exactly stolen it brand new- blown open with holes, some perfectly round from the lasers fired previously, some more like tears- probably metal peeling off from her rather rough decent into this planets atmosphere. Which was freaky to even _look_ at because that meant she had been inches from death probably, but at least the sunlight could stream in.

The whole ship was facing the ground, with the cockpit of it being the lowest part and the engines sticking up. She was collapsed awkwardly between her chair and the main console, not having made a move to get up quite yet.

She definitely _would_ get up, in like, a second- but she was honestly a little worried about the repercussions of being thrown around a small metal object like a pin-ball when all she was made out of was meat and gooey stuff. Meat and gooey stuff don’t like it when you did that, she had found.

And even laying perfectly still, almost every part of her hurt- nothing felt too horrible, heavy bruising mostly she was guessing, by the familiar way particular spots on her throbbed- but standing up felt like testing her luck, and her luck did not like to be tested very much.

Pidge pinched her eyes closed for a moment, simply allowing herself to feel the insistent pain of her bruises, tight and beating and miserable.

Okay. That was enough of that. There was no time like the present to find out you were bleeding internally or your spine was broken, or what have you.

Letting out a few panicked breaths she slowly moved to a sitting position, wincing as her already persistent aches turned their intensity up a notch. It felt like she’d been squeezed like the last tube of tooth paste, but luckily it didn’t feel like that included puncturing a lung with her ribs or something equally not-good.

Which was nice. Not nice enough that the prospect of fully standing up still didn’t seem fairly unappetizing, but oh well. On the _best_ of days standing was a pain anyway.

Pidge got up, wincing as she had to move uncomfortably out from her chair, struggling a bit to fully pull herself out of the tight spot she’d ended up wedged in. After a few unhappy moments she finally extracted herself fully, standing upright- well, as upright as she could be in a diagonal ship.

Feeling vaguely accomplished squinted to see through the front window, wondering where the fuck she had landed. She knew it was a ‘green’ planet (as in it had lots of plants, not that it was actually green colored), with surprisingly earth-like bodies of water/mystery liquid, had breathable air for her species, and that it was far enough away from StupidAsshHoleFace’s territory that she’d be relatively safe on that front. That was about it. She didn’t even know what the planet was called.

What she could gleam through the broken windshield did look pretty promising- turquoise bodies of liquid all around, tall tree-ish structures that were a light purple and spindly, with protruding spiky branches and odd white and blue leave things that hung down like streamers. The planet’s atmosphere was comfortingly blue like earth, which was nice.

If this was what she assumed it was- mainly, some sort of forest or jungle- then she was better off than she’d assumed she’d be- that meant liquid that she might be able to turn into water and flora and fauna that she could potentially consume.

Cautiously, Pidge undid her helmet, confident that she’d survive breathing in this air, but not hopeful it would be _pleasant_ \- She’d had plenty of evidence against that hypothesis in fact. Fun, fun evidence.

Surprisingly, the first few intakes of air hadn’t had her choking or sputtering- it was acceptable- in fact, it was downright pleasant! The air was clean and fresh, almost minty like she’d recently swished around some mouth-wash or something, and she found herself taking a moment just to enjoy the sensation of it.

It was always nice to remember that for every planet made up entirely of lava and rocks and toxic clouds there were places like this, with new interesting, non-poisonous related sensations-, many of which she’d be the only human being to have ever experienced.

Feeling a bit more optimistic she moved slowly towards the gaping hole in the side of her ship, poking her head out.

Her optimism quickly faded at the view- she hadn’t just happened to crash beside a nice lake- she’d crashed straight over top of one, and was dangling in the air, the tip of her ship barely hovering above the calm waves. She glanced up nervously and was rewarded with an equally ‘uh-oh’ inducing sight, that the only thing that had kept her from plummeting into the mystery liquid bellow and drowning while she was unconscious was a few of the blue vine-ish things wrapped around the crumbling metal of her ship.

“Motherfucker.” She all but sighed, fighting the urge to collapse back onto her ass and have a nap.

Grumbling a bit to herself she peered hesitantly down at the bright turquoise liquid beneath her, desperately scanning the foam. The water itself was clear enough up to a point, before it began to become darker and more opaque- meaning this was a deep lake. She also hadn’t spotted any of the small pieces of her ship that were blown off littering the surface- which could only mean that they had sunk, which was bad, because it meant she’d probably sink too.

It must have been dense- a bit like quicksand perhaps? Well, even if it was, she could always just get in and use her suits jetpack to push her- she didn’t nearly have enough juice to fly her across to the shore, but what she had left would probably work to propel her through liquid for a short distance.

Biting her lip, she carefully lowered her foot down to the water, putting just the tip of her boot in to test its exact density.

Immediately she heard a surprisingly loud hissing sound explode from bellow her, and yanked her foot back onto dry land as quick as she could manage, gaping at the bit of steam that was wafting from her now ruined boot.

Well, ruined was a bit of an overstatement- her shoe was mostly fine, except for the end, where the hardy material was warped and spotted with holes. Not enough to see her foot through- she had reacted fast enough to prevent that, thank Christ, but fuck. This wasn’t water, it was acid. She was surrounded by a lake of acid.

Pidge stared at her slowly cooling boot, her gut sinking into her ass and digging its merry way to hell. Well fuck. That put a damper on things. Fuck what she said before- every planet except earth sucked, and the variety it sucked in wasn’t ‘good or bad’ so much as it was ‘in what way’.

Feeling like she was rapidly approaching a thousand year old, Pidge massaged her face wearily. Okay, so worse case scenario those vine-things would snap and she’d be plunged full body into acid that could eat through her armor in less than seconds. Good. Great. Finally someone upped the ante- she was starting to get bored! ha ha ha

Groaning in abject misery Pidge- very fucking slowly- moved across her ship, reaching for her bag with choreographed, snail like movements, worried that anything too bold might be the metaphorical straw that broke the metaphorical camel’s back and plunged her into very _non_ -metaphorical horrible death.

With that accomplished she made the same trek back in reverse, practically holding her breath, before standing unsteadily beside the newly furnished exit to her ship. Okay. Okay! Okkkaaayyyyy

All she needed was a plan! Then she’d be out of here and, uh, still stuck playing survivor-man on an alien planet, but like, baby steps right! Baby fucking steps!

So she couldn’t swim across, obviously- she couldn’t fly across, and metal didn’t float/ probably melted, so she couldn’t make a raft out of her old parts and drift to the other side. So that left her with…?

Pidge huffed out a frustrated breath- great, she was stuck in very real danger and not a fucking peep from her noggin- but five am in the morning on earth she’d be on the roof of her house sticking a toaster oven to a microfiber- wait- _roof_ -

Pidge wobbly moved to the side of the wall before cautiously gripping some of the metal and climbing up the side- her bruises stinging like little motherfuckers and her heart beating like crazy- convinced that every new foothold would collapse and sent her plummeting.

Eventually, after about twenty years, she managed to crawl her way up to the roof of her ship, _extraordinarily_ careful not to touch the weird ass vines that held her ship up. And yeah, upon further inspection those things were freaky as hell, thin and fuzzy and either colored bright blue or pure white- it was like nothing she’d ever seen before really. She wasn’t about to try climbing up the blue ones that tangled around her ship, but there were plenty connected further down the branch. The oddly long branch, by the way- it was poking out from its ‘tree’ always on the shore of the lake, which was definitely a longer distance than most tree branches on earth stretched, even at their longest.

So all she had to do was grab a handful of the vines and Tarzan climb onto the lilac colored growth it was attached to, and then scamper her way back to its base, slide down the tree, and bam! Actual safe ground time baby!

It wasn’t a full proof plan, but it was literally the only one she had so

Ignoring the shaking in her arms and the heart palpitations she was currently experiencing, Pidge reached across and grabbed one of the blue fuzzy vines, tugging on it firmly to test its strength. After multiple pulls just short of her sending herself off the ship with her own effort, she determined it was strong enough to take her weight. Probably. Maybe. Hopefully.

Sucking in a gigantic breath she brought her feet up, officially suspending herself based on the vines strength alone. She should have probably moved instantly, but she couldn’t help but freeze for a few seconds, tense enough that she could feel her own muscles twitch with apprehension.

When nothing happened she slowly began to climb, determined not to look down. It went smoothly enough- she had made leaps and bound from her Garrison days, physically speaking, but this was basically the equivalent of that rope climbing exercise everyone hated and she’d never bothered to even try to perform. The acid rocking pleasantly bellow her was one way to put a fire under her ass though, Iverson shoulda’ tried _that_

Scooting her way across the branch itself was a bit better- though the weirdly bumpy texture of the object beneath her was creepy enough- it looked and felt a bit like very firm toad’s skin. If you don’t think that sounds gross, good for you, and also, you were very welcome to take her place.

She breathed a shaky sigh of relief when she finally made her way to the tree itself, considering the most directly dangerous parts were finally over.

Or at least that was the _theory_. Because irony, god, lemony snicket, or _whomever_ the fuck it was that controlled her life- the sicko- had decided that this was the perfect time for her to slip.

One moment her shoe was toeing a particularly gross wart thing, and the next she was desperately scrabbling to get a solid purchase because she was literally mili-seconds from being acid-ed to death

Luckily she had managed to spot a singular white vine and hold on for dear life- and though it was only for a few seconds she had the time to think- _hey, what makes the white ones different from the blue ones anyway?_ And _why were none of them holding up my ship?_ Before the plant snapped easily under her weight and she fell, pushing her body towards the shore as a last ditch attempt to spare herself.

And it almost worked.

Almost

Pidge let out a scream, high pitched and panicked and animal-like, because her leg was _hot_

_hot_

_burning burning fuck_

_burst forward onto shore drag herself hot fuck upup onto the onto the fuck fuck her leg_

_because she_

_her leg_

_had herleg had_

_fuck fuck fuck fuck_

_she was on the ground ground hotfuck burning pain fuck fuck fuckingfuck ground she was there was fuck her leg her leg herleg_

_she had to she was her leg hotburning fuck fuck acid if she fell fell leg ittouched the fuckingacid water fuck_

_and she wasscream and crying and matt and her dad and fuck fuck her leg fuckinghurt the ground the dirt taste like dirt an acid and legand pain and goneand dead and pain and falling and fuck fuck fuck_

_and_

_and-_

Pidge blacked out.

* * *

When she woke up she was curled in a tight ball, every single one of her muscles cramped, and sore, and spasming - her bruises singing an all new tune of even more severe hellish-ness, and her mouth was full of alien dirt that somehow tasted just like earth dirt except for a bit more sour. Her tongue was bleeding inside her mouth too, and the thick bitterness of the iron did nothing to improve the taste.

But it was hard to focus on all that, because her leg was on fire, and if you’ve ever had a part of your body spontaneously catch flame, you’ll know how distracting that can be.

Pidge let out a long stream of swears, tears immediately pouring out from her already abused eyes, unable to concentrate on anything but the feeling of immense pain radiating from below

It was unlike anything she’d ever felt before- pulsing and agonizing and completely insufferable- like someone was squeezing broken bones into paste and mushing them around inside her leg- like she was being repeatedly run over by the world’s largest dump truck, it’s tires super heated after a day in the scorching sun- it was like falling into a lake of acid.

She distantly knew she was hyperventilating, her breathing coming out in too-quick choked gasps, just like she distantly knew she was probably in shock, or that she had to lift her head up around now because the nausea she was feeling ramp up was probably going to result in her throwing up- but that’s all it was. _Distant_. Because none of it mattered. Nothing did. Not her, not her missing family, or her dreams or fears or anything, _anything_ else- all that existed was _pain_ , and it would never end.

Pidge managed to turn her head sideways, weakly throw up, and convulse a bit before fainting this time.

* * *

The next time she woke up wasn’t that much better than the first, and she spent more than a few minutes sweating and whimpering on the ground, not even caring that her own vomit was inches away from her nose, smelling sweetly sour and horrible.

After an indeterminate amount of time she started to actually be able to think things.

The first was; fuck can we not do _that_ again

Followed closely by; is my leg gone?

Which was a pretty good question, because even though she could still feel it- (of course she could, it was basically all she _could_ feel)- she wasn’t totally convinced it hadn’t been melted clean off. It really had to be. It felt like it was.

Which would not be great for so many reasons, one of which being that she enjoyed having two legs. Pidge blinked back hot tears, her cheeks puffed up and sore still from all the sobbing she vaguely remembered doing.

She had to get up. She had to get up and check her leg. She had to treat the wound, if it could be treated at all. She had to.

Pidge stared at the beige colored blades of grass-look-alike dully, not moving an inch.

Not looking wouldn’t make the wound go away- she wasn’t a toddler, fooled into thinking her parents were gone when they played peek-a-boo because she had no object-permanence. In fact, sitting here uselessly probably only made things worse, medically speaking.

Pidge spat a mixture of blood, mucus, vomit, and dirt out of her mouth, cringing at the taste.

She still didn’t move, breathing long shaky breaths, her fingers clenching and unclenching.

Fuck.

Pidge sighed, closing her eyes tight enough that she started to see dots of negative space on the back of her eyelids.

 _Fuck_.

She moved, her shoulder blades clenching with tension as she slowly, carefully, brought herself to a sitting position, leaning heavily against the bastard tree she’d originally fallen off of.

She sat for a second, panting, her eyes still stuck on the pieces of grass littered where her head used to lay.

She didn’t want to look.

She looked.

It wasn’t as bad as she’d feared it’d be- it certainly wasn’t as bad as it _felt_.

Her left leg lacked any sort of armor or covering from the knee down, though that entire area wasn’t burned. But the burn wasn’t small exactly either- covering from the heel of her foot to midway through her calf- and it, well, it wasn’t pretty.

Pidge had seen electrical burns- she was a Holt after all, she’d practically been born with a screwdriver in her hand and band aids covering her fingers- occupational hazard really. It didn’t look like a laser burn either, which were a whole different beast.

Her skin was dark surrounding the area with odd patches of white and grey and red mixed in- and the direct burn itself was disgusting- wrinkled and spotted and bloody, and she could only look at it for a few seconds directly before she had to turn away, hacking up bile.

It wasn’t as bad as it felt, but it was really, really, bad- because it was _real_. That was her skin- not some video game characters or someone in a movie, or even some alien that she barely knew- it was her leg- it was _hers_

Pidge closed her eyes, stuttering out a few whimpers despite herself.

Fuck fuck fuck

She couldn’t stop thinking that _this wasn’t fair_ \- even though that was illogical and unhelpful and just plain stupid- because what about her life had been fair up until this point? What about the cold depths of space had screamed ‘reasonable and equal and full of justice’- she already knew this, she already…

but god, it just wasn’t fucking _fair_. All she wanted was to rescue her brother and father! To _save_ them! She wasn’t a bad person, she didn’t _deserve_ \- but no. That wasn’t what this was about. Fate didn’t exist, god didn’t exist. No one was keeping _tally_ \- her leg was burned because she slipped- nothing more, nothing less.

Pidge opened her eyes again, and leaned lightly, attempting not to even slightly budge her injured leg as she reached for her bag, which had luckily made it through the experience relatively unscathed.

She attempted to zip open one of its pockets, growing more and more frustrated as her fingers failed to follow her commands- shaky and sweating and lagging behind, she felt like a baby with no control over her own limbs. _I didn’t even burn you_ , she thought aggressively at her fingers, too pissed to even cheer when she finally managed to grip the damn zipper and tear the thing open.

Already exhausted just from that little adventure she rummaged sloppily through her bags contents, gripping the container she needed harshly in her unstable hands and dragging it out into the light.

It was basically a first aid kit, albeit a high tech one she’d put together herself- and by ‘put together herself’, she meant ‘stole individual parts from other people’ (aliens. whatever.)

Pidge was a certified genius, but her expertise lay in electricity and wires and steel and the cold logic of a computer- not in biology- so she mostly didn’t understand exactly how a lot of this bullshit worked, just that it _did_ , which was good enough for her.

She popped the case open with one hand, her other still lying limply at her side, mostly because she could barely concentrate on moving one arm, never mind two.

Pidge stared at the medicinal bullshit blankly for a moment, searching her mind for something that could improve the burning agony that was radiating from her foot.

Carefully she reached for her canteen of Harlgarh mineral water- a pure liquid that had barely noticeable numbing qualities and was supposed to be quite good at disinfecting wounds without burning like alcohol. This shit sold as well as bulmera crystals in some systems, and having used it before, she was inclined to agree with its positive reputation.

She held it above her wound, breathing heavily. _This would not hurt as much as most disinfectants_ \- she tried to tell herself- _it wouldn’t even hurt as much as normal water would!_

Somehow she wasn’t relaxed.

Pidge poured, trying to get any of the acid from the lake out, as well as any dirt she’d dragged into the wound previously.

“Fucker!” Pidge screamed, the biting pain that had so consumed her before immediately rearing its ugly head- and she listed to the side, dizzy and sweating like she’d run a marathon.

She sat still for a few minutes, waiting- fuck, _praying_ \- for the pain to cease, or at least go back to manageable level. And after a while, it did, the numbing quality of the mineral water adding a barely noticeable reprieve as well.

Pidge twitched a bit, before looking down at her hand, which was wrapped so hard around the canteen she’d been clutching that the metal was bent slightly. She screwed the lid back on and carefully put it back into the first-aid case.

Then she sat for a moment, listening to her heartbeat slow to a more normal pace.

Sighing, she lifted up a tube of pink cream and spread it liberally around both her hands. This was the stuff she used for her numerous electricity burns, and it had always seemed to work wonderfully- she had no idea how much or how little acid burns could be compared, but it was a place to start at least.

She didn’t know what it did really- it obviously helped with pain, but she wasn’t sure if it had some other sort of healing qualities as well, or if that was just her mind playing tricks on her. Whatever, even if it was only a pain suppressant she wasn’t exactly going to complain.

Exhausted and stressed and beyond pissed off she reached down towards her burn, shivering at the sight of it- the main part of the burn was _concave_ \- a whole part of her leg had been _melted_ off.

Actually touching the wound was far less and far _more_ painful than pouring the water over it- it wasn’t nearly as forceful a blow, but at the same time it wasn’t done so quickly either- she had to rub the cream smoothly around the whole area, and every moment she touched her own injured skin it was like she was peeling it off.

Hands, once _again_ , shaking- (she was going to have trembling hands forever, she decided)- she wiped off the remainder of the cream on her pants, and slowly put away the tube. Now she just needed to bandage, and then she’d be _done_.

(Yes she knew there was so much more to do in general- but she refused to even _consider_ the rest of it until she could stop fucking with the black hole of fucking _pain_ that was her left leg right now)

Bandaging was about as pleasant as the rest of it, though it felt a bit better spiritually speaking, because it meant she didn’t have to look at her ugly rotting awful leg anymore! Because it made her want to throw up and panic and die all at once, and she’d love to stop looking at it _thanks_

And then she stopped. She rested her back against the bastard tree again, and closed her eyes- not out of her own will really, her body had decided enough was fucking enough, and it was all she could do not to collapse the moment she’d tied the last bandage.

* * *

Her sleep had been black and quick and perfect, and she’d only woken up because off a high pitched and alarming screech that had sounded out in the distance.

Panicking- and inwardly chastising herself for falling asleep in such a vulnerable state- she woke up, hazel eyes immediately scanning the area for threats, her hands brought up uselessly to somehow protect her.

The small clearing she was in didn’t so much as budge despite her paranoia, yellow-ish grass looking stuff waving softly in the breeze, horrible purple wart tree’s looming ominously overhead just as they had last. The stupidly placid looking acid lake stayed calm and inviting, what with its startling beautiful turquoise hue. Her shitty ship was still held up barely by a few blue (and _just_ blue!) vines.

The only thing different was now the sky was darker, with the cheerful azure color morphing slowly into more of a dark purple color on one side, and on the other the sun was lowering surrounded by vivid pink.

That and she could distantly hear some sort of animal making horrible screeching noise father away in the jungle- a bunch of them, if she was correct- sort of like melancholy wolf howls, or chilling coyote yipping, except for _horrible_ and _bad_. It sounded like that scene in Jim Carrey Grinch movie where he ran his creepy spider finger along a car. So not exactly majestic.

Pidge yawned, her bones creaking and her bruises complaining as she stretched- careful to leave her left foot entirely out of the occasion. She might have had a good sleep, but she knew her back would kill her later for having a nap upright against a hard tree in an awkward angle. She still found it hard to care.

Her leg still hurt, but it was more of a constant droning, throbbing pain, rather than a sharp burst of burning hot agony that seemed like it went on forever. A marketed improvement one could say.

Pidge sighed, massaging her temple for a moment.

Okay. So first thing was first; she had to establish the basics: Shelter, water, food. After that she could start figuring out how exactly she was going to get off this hell planet- which honestly concerned her less at this point, seeing as the chances of her dying before then where so fucking high.

At one point in her travels she’d stolen a machine that could convert many types of foreign liquid into a different type of liquid that had suited its original creator’s digestive needs- she’d slowly converted it into her own personal H2O maker, though it wasn’t exactly perfect. It wouldn’t just work on anything, and also, it obviously couldn’t transfer anything that was so destructive it would destroy the machine itself. Like lava.

Or acid.

Luckily she knew something it worked on that was never in short supply- her own urine! Yay! It was the grossest solution, but it had saved her ass on multiple occasions- not that she was ever going to tell _anyone_ that- like, once she got back her brother and father and moved her family somewhere safe, the ‘I drunk my own pee’ secret was going to her fucking grave.

She had some provisions with her, stuff that wouldn’t go bad- but it would only last so long before she ran out and starved- it was much better to find a stable food source _before_ that happened.

Shelter was an interesting issue as well- she had to find something well protected from the elements, close to a source of food, but preferably uphill where she wouldn’t have to deal with anymore acid lakes than strictly necessary. The problem with all that, of course, was that it meant she’d have to like, get up, and go find this place herself.

As in walk.

As in use her legs.

Specifically her left one.

Which was an obvious no-no. She’d probably have to make a cane of some sort, or else just hobble around pitifully.

Pidge ran a hand over her face, too tired to cry but still feeling like she could go for another round.

Unfortunately, she still had a mission- her brother and father weren’t just going to find themselves, and every minute she spent moping around was one more minute they’d be tortured in some horrible Galra prison. When she looked at it like that, she actually had the better deal!

Pidge snorted, before moving an arm up to the tree to steady herself, and painstakingly began to stand up. And she did mean _pain_ stakingly. Pidge swore viciously under her breath as her left leg screamed in high pitched pain- muttering things that would have even made her _mother_ flinch. (maybe)

And then she was up- albeit heavily leaning against the bastard wart tree, with one leg not even touching the ground- like some sort of demented flamingo.

 _Technically_ , there was nothing wrong with her foot itself, just the heel and almost the entirety of her calf. And also _technically_ the human body could survive two minutes in space without a suit and sustain no permanent injury, but you didn’t exactly see people leaping for a chance to do _that_ did you!

So limping it was! The ground was pitifully free of sticks or twigs to use as a cane- in fact, other than a sort of grey-ish dirt, and beige grass like plants, it was barren of any other low level plants or brush. No bushes, or ferns, or even long grasses- it was vaguely creepy for reasons she couldn’t quite explain.

Something about the vulnerability she supposed, the _openness_ \- the ‘branches’ of the wart trees were incredibly high up, and the long vines themselves only showed up occasionally- many of the trees were basically empty. There was no casual cover. Anything could see you from pretty far away.

The upside to that being, of course, that you could _also_ see anything from quite a distance, but it didn’t really make Pidge feel all that better.

As silently as she could, she started forward, essentially hobbling from tree trunk to tree trunk, swearing violently to herself anytime her foot even so much as _brushed_ the ground.

This was going to suck.

* * *

Surprising exactly no one it did, in fact, suck.

She was pretty sure hours had gone by, though it was hard to tell- despite the sun having gone down a while ago, things were still pretty bright out- it wasn’t like, daytime or anything, but it wasn’t as dark as nights on earth got. Which she would normally be fascinated by, but right now she was mostly just immensely thankful- she didn’t need anything else making this fun little trek any more miserable than it already was.

And it _was_ miserable. Her right leg was incredibly sore from taking most of her weight, and her left wasn’t doing much to help- painfully throbbing every few seconds, with the exception of when she banged it against anything _ever_ \- to which it would respond with what felt like _hours_ of untapped agony.

The ground was cold and just vaguely muddy enough that stuck to her skin and boots, and the creepy long winded animal screeches she was hearing in the distance constantly didn’t help her mood any.

Her bruises, despite hurting so much less than her leg, refused to stop being little bitches, which felt unfair and rude and she hated her body.

She’d had also yet to actually spot so much as a singular animal track, despite the noises she could hear- and she’d never thought she’d miss bugs, but fuck, she even missed bugs. It was just so quiet! Sort of!

Whatever, the point was she was having a bad time.

And then she heard something strange- and by strange, she meant fucking outrageous.

“Fuck!” Shouted a male sounding voice harshly, followed by a loud metallic ‘thunk’.

Pidge blinked.

She did not, in fact, have her translator on.

So.

That was an English ‘fuck’.

Spoken by- by a human.

It _had_ to be- Earth was a hick planet, barely known at all by most species- she’d never met anyone who even knew how to say ‘hello’, never mind the f-bomb.

So there was a human. Here. In the middle of bum-fuck nowhere.

Pidge didn’t so much decide to speed up as she did so instinctively, pushing herself off from the tree she’d been slowly leaning against, hobbling as rapidly as she could towards the sound.

There were only four humans in space that she knew of- Shiro, Matt, her dad, and her. That was _it_ \- but- but she’d recognize the rest of those voices from a thousand miles away- so who-?

Pidge broke through into a clearing; eyes wide open in surprise at the sight that greeted her.

First of all, eye-catchingly, there was a massive fuck-off red spaceship, that was, of all things- shaped like a fucking lion-

Which huh? _huh???????_ That- Was That A _Voltron_ Lion??? WhAt tHE fUcK??

The second thing she noticed was what looked like a male human teenager with long black hair and bizarrely purple eyes, and she happened to notice his presence a little _too_ late seeing as he was racing towards her with A GLOWING RED **_SPACE_** _KNIFE_

Pidge furiously backpedaled, before immediately collapsing onto her ass in pain because in her utter panic she’d forgotten that her entire leg was Fucked Up and therefor ‘backpedaling furiously’ was a _little_ above her pay-grade.

Her falling like a baby newborn deer didn’t seem to stop the paladin, who apparently on the fucking _warpath_ , basically tackled her further to the ground and shoved his glowing sword-thingy up against her neck.

Pidge, of course, knew when she was beat and was willing to give up and talk reason to this madman.

Her instincts however, had different plans.

So fluidly she was _almost_ impressed, she whipped up her arm and pushed with strength she was unaware she _even_ had, throwing the boy’s weapon upward and slamming the hilt painfully into his chin, which closed with an audible ‘click’

Her follow up was just as swift, her other hand rushing forward to grab a sizable chunk of the boys long hair, and use it to _slam_ his head back into the hilt of his weapon, her other hand guiding it forcefully into his nose, which immediately started bleeding.

Luckily the blood seemed to snap her out of her own muscle memory, and she used the distraction to roll to the side and out of his reach instead of attacking- a move that worked excellently except for the part where her leg was half-melted off and she kept _forgetting_ , so she just ended up harming herself further, and let out an _embarrassing_ cry of involuntary pain.

The boy flinched back at this, leaning upwards to look at her from his half crouched position, one of his hands pressed up against his nose, trying, and failing, to suppress the bleeding.

He blinked, staring at her for a few seconds, his eyebrows shot up so far they were hidden under his messy hairline.

There was a moment of silence and Pidge awkwardly shifted so that she’d be sitting up instead of writhing in pain on the ground, which was what she _wanted_ to be doing.

“You’re…human?” The boy asked quietly, his voice serious and restrained but oh so nostalgic- fucking English, _god_ , what a beautiful language (said _nobody_ except her in this one _very_ peculiar instance)

Pidge smiled shakily, _thoroughly_ embarrassed by this whole performance.

“Yep…uh, sorry, uhm, about surprising you, and also, uh, doing _that_.” She muttered uncomfortably, gesturing to his face in general.

The boy shifted his hold, trying to staunch the blood that was rapidly staining his chin a little better.

“It’s fine. I didn’t-… I shouldn’t have attacked you.” He responded, sounding like speaking the words aloud was physically painful.

Then they stared at each other for a little bit longer.

“Soo…Voltron huh? How’s that?” She asked, feeling like this whole situation would be hilarious later, but was just very stilted right now. The boy tensed for a moment, looking ready to spring into action, but relaxed a bit when Pidge didn’t try to bite his head off or whatever it was he was afraid she was gonna do.

He shrugged, looking vaguely confused.

His eyes flicked down to her exposed bandage, now lightly stained with blood thanks to her rolling around on the ground like a moron.

“You’re hurt.” It wasn’t a question, but then again what was she gonna say,’ _no’_?

Pidge grunted, sitting up a bit more, and cautiously moving her wounded leg to a more comfortable position.

“Yeah, I don’t advise going for a swim around these parts.” She chuckled bitterly, trying not to worry about exposing her weakness so openly in front of a stranger. It was _fine_ , he came from the same planet as her, he was the same species, he spoke the same _language_ \- practically family they were.

The boy’s face scrunched up adorably, almost looking offended on her behalf.

“The water is hot enough to burn?” He asked, looking vaguely disturbed. Pidge put out her hand and made an ‘ehh sort of’ gesture, tipping it from side to side.

“It’s acid.” She answered, darkly amused by the way the boy flinched a bit, glancing down at the offending foot anxiously.

Another long silence ensued.

“Do you have a name I can call you?” She asked carefully, wanting to stop referring to him as ‘the boy’ in her head, but well aware that names were a sensitive subject among some.

He nodded, looking a bit conflicted, but spoke anyway.

“Keith. You?” _Keith_? Oof, poor guy.

“Pidge Gunderson at your service.” She smiled, nodding her head in a bastardized bow. Keith stared at her some more, but eventually spoke.

“Are you stuck here?” He questioned carefully, beginning to wipe his bloody hands on his suit now that the bleeding had stopped- it fit in disturbingly well with the red parts, but looked particularly gruesome on the white.

Pidge scoffed and gestured at herself.

“What you don’t think I live here?” She laughed at his grumpy expression before continuing.

“Yeah, crash landed here, my ships as good as scrap metal.” She replied factually, but couldn’t keep the exhaustion out of her voice- she still wasn’t sure how she was going to rectify that- she was good, but it wasn’t like she could build a spaceship from dirt and non-existent twigs. Keith gazed at her intensely for a moment, and she felt bizarrely self-conscious despite the fact he wasn’t doing it in a creepy way- it felt like he was trying to look straight _through_ her, and she wasn’t a big fan.

After a moment, he cleared his throat.

“I crashed here as well…but my ship… _red_ , she’ll be fully operational in a few hours.” Pidge gaped- okay; wow; _now_ she understood all the legends about these machines- they truly _were_ wonders of technology.

“If you want…I can help you. I’d have to go back to- to my base first, but, after that we can get you home.” Pidge's open mouthed gape slowly turned into an amazed smile, one that she hadn’t used in what felt like years- holy shit, that was one of the nicest things anyone had ever offered her- and this dude had tried to stab her, like, a few seconds ago!

Of course, she couldn’t go _home_ yet, but she’d take what help she could get.


End file.
